Maybe it was strength, speed and endurance. Maybe it was the cape.

But while flipping a wine barrel end to end down Main Street in Jordan as spectators cheered, Yvonne Irvine knew she was on a roll.

The assistant winemaker at Creekside Estate Winery clocked under 19 seconds in the annual barrel race, a crowd favourite at Twenty Valley Winter Winefest.

“The hardest part is getting around the corner,” said Irvine, who won the coveted Golden Boot on Saturday.

“When I made the corner and I was coming back, I felt I had some good speed.”

Competitors from wineries charged down the course flipping the barrels that weighed more than 45 kilograms.

It was one of several events, including a fashion show, celebrity chef dinner with David Rocco, after party and live music, that drew large numbers to this year’s three-day festival.

Irvine said icewine is unique and it’s great to have an event that celebrates it.

“It’s really fun. Most people hate winter. It’s so nice to get out, do some winter activities … Beat the winter blues.”

Kris Smith, executive director of Twenty Valley Tourism, said she expected the festival would hit its goal of 10,000 visitors this year, if not exceed it. It had about 9,400 visitors in 2016.

“We’re pretty jam-packed right now.”

While the festival draws local Niagara residents, it also saw visitors from as far away as Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, Tennessee, Texas and Alberta this year.

Smith said people are hearing about it through social media and on the Internet.

“A lot of it is returning or families or word of mouth. We don’t advertise that deep into the U.S. but people are finding out about us. It’s exciting.”

She said the festival has added a lot of diverse programming over the past couple of years, such as an icewine puck challenge and chef’s one-*** challenge in an effort to have something for everyone. That’s proving to be successful, she said.

It also introduced a European market theme last year, ditching larger tents for smaller ones around the perimeter featuring wine and food. More heaters were dotted throughout the area and included large steel pinecone fire pits that visitors could cosy up to.

“We just opened it up and embraced the great outdoors,” Smith said. “We’re Canadians. We should be embracing winter so that’s part of it.”

Sue-Ann Staff, president of the tourism association, owner of Sue-Ann Staff Estate Winery and barrel-rolling competitor, said the festival had a larger footprint than ever before and more vendors.

“It’s fantastic,” she said. “I’m really proud of our organizers, our volunteers, the board, the directors. We just keep fine-tuning this event every year. It looks better. There’s more entertainment, more energy. It’s awesome.”Read more at:http://www.marieaustralia.com/cocktail-dresses | www.marieaustralia.com/red-carpet-celebrity-dresses

Lined up like village colleens, all waiting for the dance
A nervous last audition, their ballroom of romance
All dressed in scarlet dresses, wearing their Sunday best
Their generation’s finest, the blender’s final test

Grenache, Merlot and Syrah, Cabernets one to four
Waiting on the tasting bench, resplendent in Self-Pour
The winemaker is ready, the arbiter supreme
Nervous giggles, chatter, perhaps perchance to dream

He swirls, he spits, he noses, the PH not quite there
Acidity is lacking, but the perfume fills the air
Lavender, thyme and pepper, the Languedoc garrigue
Bound for the assemblage, will they sadden or intrigue?

Some samples he pulls forward, some he treats with disdain
Some will make the final marriage, others will remain
The wine-stained tasting notebook, the splashes on the tiles
The debris of the tasting room; chin up, maintain your smiles

The Cabernet’s cool and distant, Mourvedre’s in a bit of a mood
The Merlot will pull, it’s certain, the Cinsault will sing and be rude
I lack their front, their bravura, mine’s a subtle sense of style
I need a change of fashion, quiet drinking for a while

Drought and stress I overcame, frost and hail and rain
Treat my soul with gentleness, rejection feeds the pain
Eager, smile and puppy eyes, a dance? why, yes, of course
But after one turn round the floor, a thank-you, no remorse

If the vintage will allow me, I will return once more
An ordinary heartbreak, walk back across the floor
Pick up my coat from the kitchen, stoic, show no pain
Make my way to the chip shop, and a long walk home in the rain

i've recently rediscovered the genius of Al Purdy...
i mean: what famous Canadian is there to speak of?
Bukowski managed to cite him, once in a reading...
eh... reading Al Purdy sober is an uneventual,
but reading him... sobering up...
- in the garden
-  the winemaker's beat-étude (eh-t'yew-d)
- dead seal...
                    esp. the last poo'em...
                      what wondrous points of observation...
i'm trying to untangle myself from
the shackles of an NVQ qualification
concerning crowd security...
the instructor confirms... the answers are silly...
no... they're not... they're just blatant...
painfully obvious... like why you might check
the "magic wand" of a metal detector...
switch it on... hold out a piece of metal:
see if it "magic wand" is receptive to metal...
of course i am not demeaned, my i.q. didn't suddenly
*******... but formal language is:
formal language... as part of the cohort that minds
the safety of crowds: i have to employ some slack
when at times i drift into informal, loose associated
language... it's part of the ******* deal...
impossible to chew for my ego, it just has to be done...
rubric after rubric, buzz-words...
as much as i don't need the extra money:
hey, extra money, saves me from investing
in an umbrella, if a rainy day of metaphors makes
sense... i'm not going to spend the money
on frivolities... if there's a function of being part
of society that invokes you earning money...
sure...
i spent all of my 20s and half of my 30s not earning
money... then again: i felt no impetus to spend it,
beside on cigarettes, travel, whiskey,
a piece of clothing once in a while: one i really liked...
a fat-face material, teasing khaki shirt that could be
used to replace a jacket...
dimmed green material trousers...
regular dark navy jeans from C & A...
a baker-boy cap...
if anything can undermine capitalism...
it won't be communism...
it will come in the form of... bachelors...
women tend to spend more...
economy is a focus on the spending patterns of women...
beside all the food... who spends idle pounds
for idle things? most certainly not women...
i'm still having to send an email
to a bicycle shop about my 1 hear guarantee on
the tyres...
two flat tyres in a space of a week?
faulty rubber... i spent £500 on a Merlin Trek bicycle...
why? i'm perfectly happy cycling on
a £125 Viking road bicycle...
i think i was concerned about my initial weight...
in at 120kg... but since then i'm oscillating in the range
of 96kg through to 98kg...
a 6th of me is... ahem... "missing"...
no stretch marks... as gym bro used to say...
if you want to loose excess mass...
use the bicycle, or swim... never, ever: go to the gym...
this problem arrived for a loose friend of mine...
he wanted to lose weight... fat ******...
drank to much beer but most certainly ate too many
crickets of potato...
fervently adhered to a gym regime...
ended up... with... loose skin... with stretch marks...
not enough cardiovascular exercise...

from time to time i think about: performing...
why are all the current, vocal poets...
so... ******* exasperated in their performance?
i'm not going to put my tongue into a pool
of piranhas... no chance...
i'll sit this out like a "clever" humpty-dumpty...

to use "their" language: i don't think i'd feel safe...
if i don't like internet drama...
what could real life application of my poetry,
being spoken, reflect?
i'm not going to do something that's counter
to a welcome impetus because i'm a coward...
i'd be a coward if i were staged with an audience
of murderers... i'd do that...
but i just can't do... a crowd of pacified buggery
of the tongue...
i can't concede to people who sleep in Iron Maidens
for a tease of "luck"...

my my.... what a funfair Al Purdy has become...
only when sobering up...
hardly when in the zenith of sober...

- see, i don't remember the last time i owned a credit card,
well, i do, but it was such a hassle...
a month later some separate statement from the bank
informed me that i bought something using a credit card...
of course i paid it...

come to think of it...  i only think of:
Caravaggio's: the calling of st. matthew...
i like my given names...
it's either st. matthew or it's...
    Conrad I of Masovia...
or Conrad II, the Salic...
                    i too look at the loot as if an
elephant might be looking at peanuts....
these, be, pebbles, no?

i haven't used the credit system in a while,
i work from primarily the debit scores...
i never spend more than i get,
if i want to ****, i go to a brothel,
why would i bother myself with ****-teasing
where women have it so easy?
i want to be detached from intimacy:
i just want a hard-on...

some give, some don't... take two...
the ones that don't give end up revising the dynamic
by changing their hair, a little...
so now i'm going to have a fetish for
school-girls, pig-tails and what not?
seriously... i was going to go for the one that
really wanted to **** me,
not the one that made a whim at ******* me...

to date: i haven't been on any dates...
good for me...
i don't date, i talk, sure, we can talk, type...
i'm such a terrible grammar ****,
with my stature i'd fit right in in a...
whether it was Coco Chanel or Hugo Boss that
fitted out the SS-Übermenschen...
perhaps i might trim my beard a little...

but all that grey & black...
the best attired army in the history of man!
what style!
plus, most people confusing me with
a German physiognomy:
i could fit, right in... see... i don't mind...
i can play the part... i'm only going to ever be
a D-list actor... but... with being in this tier below
the socially venerated A-class...
i find... it's more... fun!

- like i wish i was a teenager in the 1980s...
going to the cinema to watch some horror movies...
i wouldn't want to be a teenager in the 1990s...
i was a teenager in the 2000s... some sort of oops...
some sort of oh...
going on dates gleefully...
waiting for a song like Pseudo Echo's:
  His Eyes... vendredi 13th: partie cinq...
oh my god, dating must have been fun...
for the simple fact that you'd go to the cinema!

- thank god i missed the whole dating app scene,
the whole... what do you call it? only fans?
standard, orthodox me... to the brothel!
or to the alley! or to the forest... to find my echo!
there i found it... there i was, too!

- back up... i was on a date once...
we went to the Tate Modern to see an Edward Hopper
exhibition, i bought a book which i asked her to sign...
she dedicated it with the words:
you're too good looking to be like the people in
these paintings, she misspelled something...

we later took a train back to watch a movie...
Troy... whenever that came out...
then we went for sushi...
    we talked & talked...
she got on a train and my "friend" messaged me,
she has the butterflies...
the same friend later sent her a phallus picture...
some friend....
  whatever...

     she's now happily married and with children,
i ventured to ask her how she was dealing,
with a new arrival i said to her:
yoi're the saddest face i've ever seen...
i was implying her Henry VIII conundrum...
6 children down, all female?!
i was implying: no sons?!
i don't think she was receptive of my... "argument"...
she was the eldest sister of...

a sister younger than her, but also two...
younger brothers... while she only managed to give sowing
of females.... there is a count of five, plus a sixth...
and they're all girls?!
if Henry VIII isn't worried,
i don't  know who might be!

you might be?!

i was reading Heidegger when she chose her husband...
a *******-addicted pundit at the local pub...
with a stable income... 20 years her senior...
circa... i like the simulation of endearing babes
with onomatopoeias... i love the moments
when clucking the tongue is a reciprocated language
shared... all that's missing are
horse hooves...

cats, babies, what's the ******* difference?!
one has less fur than the other...
both need to be tended to: irrespective of their status...
when the word first arrives in the consciousness
of a baby: i generally weep...
look how memory is blockaded...
how it has arrived at a cyclic expression...
falsely imagination takes over as... cursor...
fail...
    
if every free-roaming cat could be replaced by
a toddler... one that might shove a finger into your
mouth, or pull at your beard...
i'd be a happy man... an Abraham...
a God...

- but then i figured... these days...
no kid of deity could have easy access to the...
benevolence of crowds... even if informing
individuals of their presence...
psychiatric safety measures:
someone ought to be paid...
recently stressors for claiming: over-*******
is subjected to criticism...

even prince Will the 3rd... has to get slack...
slick, mate... slack, no chance....
not with this crowd.....

hey presto, the end,,, this desired democracy no
other culture would ever arrive at,
but since the English are so ingeniously...
individualistic...
why bother them, why bother them?!
as Pontius Pilate implied...
let all be: free game...
let's see what happens!

         i have enough of care...
let's just see what happens...
                            let's eat some
raisins coated in chocolate;
    no?
          i'm out... with whatever
pressures of Darwinism...
         i'm mostly likely to state:
most perfectly, dead,
how are you, faring?
i want to get off this ******* caraousel,
don't you?

dead end, dire, begin with...
shoot yourself in the foot, dear Englishman.

The possibilities of humans are limitless,
All the goodness that intelligent minds offer us is immeasurable.
I often call them gods—
I worship the book—
I worship the hacker who managed to cleanse my computer from a dark virus.
You would be a liar if you’ve never once worshipped someone or something.
Now I drink wine,
I recall Dionysus,
Or I simply thank the winemaker for the beautiful wine.